


hands that hurt, hands that heal

by solikerez



Category: Star Wars, Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Canonical Character Death, F/M, it is okay to hold hands btw u can do that all u want, missing leia hours, rey and ben next time pls just run away to naboo and avoid all the cosmic bs, still thinking about how much i wish they had talked more during the death star fight, uh since ig this is That Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-08
Updated: 2020-02-08
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:14:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22608373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/solikerez/pseuds/solikerez
Summary: Rey climbs on top of Ben and makes out with his sopping self after Force healing his stab wound.
Relationships: Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 5
Kudos: 26
Collections: For one is both and both are one in love: The Reylo Fanfiction Anthology's Valentine's Day Exchange





	hands that hurt, hands that heal

**Author's Note:**

  * For [cuddlesome](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cuddlesome/gifts).



There's a certain rush to dancing like this.

Perhaps they had moved together like this in a past life. She can imagine it: the saber in his grip replaced by Rey’s calloused hand, work-hardened and rough and so very _her_ , brushing against his lips. Somehow she knows that this push and pull that tethers them together would exist in every lifetime, and they would always find themselves falling back into this cosmic dance.

It’s foolish, she knows it is. Utterly foolish to dream of past lives, of the gentlest touches, of stolen moments and lost time. Foolish when she knows what she must do to protect the people she’s grown to know, to maybe even love. Foolish when he stands opposite her, staring her down over the scarlet glow of his unstable blade, reminding her yet again that he had chosen not to fight at her back or by her side. 

What she would give to be able to shut her thoughts right out of her head.

But here, beneath the near-deafening crash of the waves which rise around them, there is that familiar thrum, and Rey swears she feels the Force _sing_ whenever he is close. 

She wills the Force to shut up for once. It doesn’t.

_Worth a try._

She’d fled the throne room knowing full well he would give chase, and yet, as he emerges from the spray, the weight of his presence pressing so fully up against her is enough to knock the wind out of her. She can tell from the way hilt sits in his gloved grip that he is no longer playing the defense. Rey readies herself as he walks through the mist toward her like a phantom in the night, and as his saber arcs down toward her, she swings her blade up to meet it.

He grits his teeth as he throws his hand out to block the wave of energy she’d pushed toward him, hoping to catch him off-guard. It’s utterly infuriating how in-tune he is with her every step. He matches every turn of her heel, spins away from each heavy-handed slash, meets her fervor with measured intensity and an unwavering gaze which burrows into her after every brief pause.

She remembers the Wayfinder that he had crushed right in front of her eyes, shattering her path forward. She remembers Finn and Poe who she had left behind to find it, in the hopes that it would be the missing piece they needed. She remembers the Resistance and Leia, her mentor and _his mother_ , who were relying on her now more than ever. She remembers Chewie, who ushered her onto the Falcon without a word when she returned bruised and bloody from the Silencer, clutching the broken pieces of Luke’s saber in hand as she walked away from the man who stands in front of her now, who she’d once dreamt of a future with. She remembers the phrase Rose had drilled into her mind during her year with the Resistance, the one she’d struggled with so much for so long. _Saving what we love. Saving what I love. What I love…_

The answer and the problem stand right in front of her. 

She squeezes the saber in her hands, coming back to herself. He’s made his choice. So will she.

She brings a heavy swing down toward his head.

“You’re angry,” he manages to grind out as he parries, stepping further away and waiting for her to make a move. He’s not _fighting_ her anymore. “But you’re in this with me. _Talk to me._ ”

"I haven't very much to say to you. Fight or yield. Don’t just stand there." She steps toward him and thrusts at him again, only for him to once again bat it away with ease. His lack of reaction only fuels her frustration.

"I've never known you to hold your tongue where I'm concerned." He knows where to press. Oh, she would give him a piece of her mind if time allowed it. 

"And that has done me very little good, clearly, seeing as we’re back where we always start. Arguing. Getting nowhere.” They’ve danced this way before, this give and take, and she knows where it ends. They can’t keep doing this for much longer.

She swings at him with a strained grunt and a little more heart.

“Then yield. Come with me to Exogol. We’re stronger together.” She knows the pleading look in his eyes, at odds with the coolness of his bored defense. She’d seen them once before, looking up from a hand she knew she could not take, however much she wanted to.

“You know I won’t. _Can’t_.” She expects a wounded look but finds that his expression has hardened once again. She reaches out through their tether, for a reason, any excuse, to toss her saber away and join him at his side. He clamps it shut faster than she can pull away. They’ve both made their choice.

She drives her saber toward him and as his crossguard locks hers in place, she sees the shift in his eyes and the furrow of his brow and knows that was his final plea. He pushes forward with his full weight and shoves Rey away, sending her stumbling back. She shakes the stinging from her wrist and looks up at the man in front of her, pushing away all thoughts of the man she’d wanted at her side. This is Kylo Ren, maskless and soaked and broken, a shadow of a better man.

He plows toward her, nearly landing two strikes as Rey slashes back, but she’s spent so much energy trying to cut him down, and he is broad and tall and frustratingly strong. This is a side of him she hasn’t seen, no longer fueled by anger or emotion, but no longer on the defense, calculated and precise in his attack. He swings as she catches her breath, once, twice, and a third powerful strike that brings her to her knees. 

She feels him then, as he lifts his walls just enough to sense her. He stands over her, his breathing mingling with the heaving of her chest, waiting for him to strike. She waits for it and hopes to the Force that she has it in her to react, but it doesn’t come. He stands still a beat too long, and that is all the time she needs to swing back at him from the ground.

He doesn’t let her get much further. Before she knows it, she’s splayed prone on the ground, and she shuts her eyes as she feels her body starting to give out. He’s above her again, and this time, as he stares down at her along the crackling length of the plasma blade, she knows he won't keep giving her chances. 

He brings his saber into a two handed-grip and raises it above his head with, and the world stops.

She feels it then, as his attention is torn from her, the way the string between them pulls taut. She knows the feeling from the look on his face, knows the feeling of the world falling away, leaving her bare and vulnerable. But this is different. She reaches out to him, expects to feel a wall slammed down between her and his consciousness and finds instead she cannot feel him at all. His mind is somewhere else, somewhere beyond their bond. She watches as he thumbs over his saber absently, switching it off and lowering it to his side. His head drops ever so slightly, as if he’s afraid to meet someone’s eyes, and turns like a man bewitched. His mind is no longer with her on Kef Bir, she knows. 

But he’s distracted now. Here is the phantom she couldn’t leave behind all this time. The string pulls tighter, but she can’t feel him on the other end. It pulls her toward a precipice, and she knows this moment is where the dance ends. This is why they are tethered. So she can reel him in and snap the thread.

She’d thought once, that the Force bringing them together didn’t have to be a curse. She’d hoped that it was a reminder that she wasn’t alone in the galaxy. There was a point, however brief, that she’d believed the Force had brought them together to show them both that they were worth something to someone, worth loving and worth fighting for. For a moment, she thought it might even have been the Force smiling upon her.

But as his grip loosens and saber tumbles from his grasp, Rey knows in this moment that this was the reason they were brought together.

The Force can be a cruel thing, sometimes.

She flips the switch the moment it’s in her hands and plunges his saber right between his ribs.

A star flickers out, and the air is knocked straight out of her lungs.

_“Leia.”_

It was _wrong._ She was wrong, so wrong about all of it. Ben, _had he felt it-_

Of course. Of course he had, that is where his mind had gone, to his mother, to Leia, he was with her and now she’s _gone._ Gone, and for what? A saber through her son’s chest, was that what she felt in her last moments? Rey hoped to the very stars that it wasn’t.

Her fingers feel numb as she switches his saber off and he collapses to the ground, shaken and bleeding out but so frighteningly quiet that she stumbles back a few steps. She needs to breathe, she needs to _be there_ , where Leia is, to see it for herself, but _no_ , how could she, when Leia’s son was dying too in front of her eyes? Leia’s only son, the man Rey had come to know and want and, stars, could she even dare to say she loved him when it is her scar he bears on her face, her hands which dealt the blows? 

Too much. There’s too much hurt here.

She shakes off her daze long enough to find him clutching his wound in a heap on the ground, and how can she meet his eyes? She braves a glance, and he is staring back at her, eyes glassy and far away, but she _feels_ him again, at the end of the bond, and Rey chokes back a sob. She couldn’t lose them both.

She’d lost so much already and gained so many burdens she wasn’t ready to bear. She wouldn’t lose him. 

She’s crawling over to him before she can even process what she’s doing, and the weight of his gaze is too heavy for her. She turns her head away as she searches blindly for his wound, splaying her hand over it and pressing down as gently as she can manage. She can’t hide from him through the bond. She feels his gaze on her, knows he can see the tears streak her cheeks. She can feel his shock, his hopelessness, his longing, and his pain. There is so much hurt here. She wishes she could will it all away.

So she gathers his pain, his weakness, his fears, and she closes her eyes, opening herself up to the Force. She sees the wounded expression on his face when she shut the door on their bond in Crait, remembers the wave of understanding and connection that had washed over her when their hands had crossed a galaxy to meet, remembers the blows they’ve dealt and the belonging they’d promised. She holds onto these memories, and draws from the very Force within her, bringing life and light to up to meet the hurt and darkness. She pours it into him and opens her eyes to look up at him as the strength starts to leave her arms. 

She drags her thumb over the hole that is burned into his tunic and keeps it there, hand flat against his chest as she leans on him for support, matching her breathing with his. She feels his heartbeat against her palm and can’t help the tears that keep coming, because he’s here and breathing and _alive_. And it’s only in this moment that she realizes how afraid she had been when she hadn’t been able to feel him at the end of that string, how empty and lonely it had felt, how much she craved him when their bond was shut, how much she wished for this closeness, connection and relief. 

The thought of losing him was more terrifying than anything. 

She almost lost him. But here he is, solid, breathing and real beneath her. And it felt more right than anything else. It occurs to her that she’s never touched him like this before. Not even back on Ahch-To, when their fingertips met and the whole galaxy seemed to turn on its head and it felt like the mismatched pieces of the world were finally falling into place. Rey had never anticipated getting to feel that way again.

But this, her hand sliding slowly up his chest to rest at his neck, feeling his pulse and the life that flows through him? This is utterly intoxicating. Pulling herself toward him to cup his face, she runs her fingers over his brow where the groove of his scar once resided. There was too much hurt here. She wants to feel every place he’s been healed and memorize every mole that is spattered across his face. She wants to take the hand she had once walked away from and never let it leave her sight or her touch again. She wishes for nothing more than to spend hours tracing every line on his palm and every callous on his fingers, kissing away the memory of their separation.

He’s looking at her like he needs her as much as she needs him, and she can’t bring herself to tear her eyes away.

Her lips find his before she can even balance herself over him, and she gasps as he falls back in surprise. His hands find purchase at the back of her neck, and she feels him draw his thumb over the hairs there, tracing circles on her skin. It’s a small gesture, but it hits Rey harder than expected; she can’t remember ever being at the receiving end of such affection.

Stars, she’d tried so hard not to let her mind wander in the past, to the feel of him underneath her, to the drag of his lips over hers, to the feeling of his hands clutching at her waist to pull her impossibly closer. She’d never imagined it would be like this. He’s soaked and she’s chilled to the bone, hair sticking to her face and clothes clinging uncomfortably to her skin but in this moment, even as her tears mingle freely with the sheen of sweat and ocean spray, Rey feels warmer than she ever has before.

She pulls back to catch her breath briefly and he chases her lips, struggling to prop himself up as Rey uses the little bit of strength she’s recovered to help pull him close again. She curses as she knocks her teeth against his bottom lip in her eagerness, and he groans against her as it splits. She would heal it in an instant if he let her, but he’s bearing down on her again in a moment. He finds his way to the corners of her lips, trailing his mouth down along her jaw and leaving open-mouthed kisses down her neck, reverent and dazed. Rey drags him back up toward her lips impatiently and murmurs an apology as she presses a kiss to the cut. It’s sanguine and heady as she runs her tongue over the seam of his mouth, and he lets her steal his breath away as their lips part, tracing the roof of her mouth as if to memorize every part of her.

She sighs his name against him and he tenses, freezing. For a moment she can’t feel him breathing and hurriedly pulls back, worrying over his features as she searches his face to make sure he’s okay and _alive_. He shakes his head, opening his mouth before snapping it shut, and his eyes are starting to look distant again. She can feel him pulling away from her, and she can’t do it, she can’t handle him shutting her out.

But the look in his eyes says he’s somewhere else. Somewhere darker. Somewhere she’s not sure she can follow.

She untangles herself from her seat in his lap and gives him space. He needs time. 

They sit silently for a few moments, and as the waves rise and fall and batter the ruins of the Death Star, the great and terrible legacy of the man whose cursed blood runs through her veins, Rey remembers why she came here in the first place. She remembers the stakes, and why she had spent so long running from the man sitting in front of her.

There was a reason why they couldn’t do this.

They were both so stubborn.

She sits back further and fights to ignore the flash of hurt that crosses his eyes as she moves away from him. She waits until his gaze meets hers fully before she finally speaks.

“I did want to take your hand. Ben’s hand.”

She stands. There’s a moment where she hesitates, unsure whether to say something more or to just walk away. Instead, she extends a hand wordlessly to the man beneath her. They stay like that for a while, and Rey holds her breath, holding his stare. This is the last time. The last dance. Her last offer. They’ll go far away from it all, from the hurt and the things that haunt them, somewhere only they know.

_Please._

He doesn’t take it. She feels the sting of his rejection seep into her bones, and she pulls away from their bond as if burned. Instead, he glances back down at the hole burned into his shirt where his saber had once pierced his skin and takes one last look at the hand being held out to him, before returning her gaze with a slow, firm shake of his head.

_Not yet._

The bond sags between them, and she’s suddenly aware of how close they had been. He’s letting her leave. Letting them both have space to process.

Rey looks down at her outstretched hand, a hand which has healed and hurt, and questions it all. How can she be the leader she’s meant to be when she cannot fully trust herself? How can she run back to the Resistance, knowing Leia is gone, knowing she lost their way to Exogol, knowing she wouldn’t be able to stop thinking about the man at the other end of her tether, hurting and grieving the loss of the only other person in the world who thought he was worth saving? How could she face her bloodline and her past, knowing that great darkness and light exist in her, and not having someone else to show her the path forward? 

Time. They both need time. And when the time comes, when they’re both strong enough to handle it, they’ll face the hurt together.


End file.
